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Pulmonary Science Courses

PUL 220 Epidemiological Foundations (4 credits)
This course is designed to provide students with a historical background in epidemiological studies. The course is also designed to expose students to the principles and concepts necessary for understanding the basics of epidemiological activity and classical epidemiological investigations. By applying knowledge from a range of disciplines, epidemiologists are able to more adequately study disease, wellness and other health-related events in populations. The ultimate goal of this course is to stimulate a desire for further education in epidemiological course work.

PUL 329 Advances in Pharmacology in Critical Care Medicine (4 credits)
This course is designed to help broaden the health care professional's knowledge of pharmacology. Topics include types and effects of drugs, including diagnostic imaging contrast media. Pharmacology, pharmacokinetics, and pharmacodynamics of drugs commonly used in ancillary health care are presented. Students taking this course will also study the most recent FDA approved medications and understand the current state of respiratory care practice in today's health care environment.

PUL 400 Health Psychology (4 credits)
This class is designed to help students learn those skills necessary in forging a bridge between the client-learner's thoughts, feelings and actions by integrating thought and behavior into one synergistic approach to the delivery of health education that can accommodate the whole person. Cognitive techniques, such as lecture, discussion, readings, presentations, collection of data and specific planning combined with the behavioral components of emotion and action will help in bringing about this synergistic process.

PUL 435 Ethics and Decision Making in Health Care Environments (4 credits)
This is a foundational course in ethics for individuals who are pursuing vocations in health care. At the completion of this course students will have a greater understanding of the ethical principles that are applied to the delivery of health care services, as well as some of the more current and pressing issues of health care delivery. Students will develop a personal model of decision-making that is consistent with core personal values as well as the ethical standards of their professions. Students will be introduced to a range of ethical challenges faced by health care practitioners today. These include but are not limited to the value and dignity of human life; beginning of life and end of life issues; confidentiality; informed consent; allocation of scarce resources; truth-telling; and the ethics of biomedical research. Students will use case studies, selected readings, discussion, and critical analysis of various models of ethical decision making to construct a personal statement of core beliefs that will guide decision making.

PUL 301 Principles of Health Care Systems (4 credits)
The objective of this course is to provide the students with a basic understanding of the health care system. As the participants progress through the course they will build their health care vocabulary, strengthen their understanding of health care concepts and have the opportunity to experience health care decision making through the evaluation of case scenarios.

PUL 342 Health Care Information Systems (4 credits)
This course is designed to introduce students to health care information systems and help them understand why the interlocking of these systems provides numerous challenges and opportunities for health care providers in the years to come. Students will learn how to collect, massage and manipulate data in order to make it useful. There is plenty of useless data and information available; the real professional can mine that data and information into golden nuggets of knowledge.

PUL 330 Sleep Medicine (4 credits)
Respiratory Therapists possess unique skills in sleep studies and patient assessment and the investigation of sleep disorders is a rapidly growing area of medicine. This course provides an overview of sleep medicine, including the anatomy and physiology of sleep and breathing. It is designed to give students an introduction to sleep disorders, polysomnography, and patient monitoring techniques and instrumentation.

PUL 322 Compliance and Regulatory Requirements for Health Care Managers (4 credits)
The focus of this course is to examine the various compliance and regulatory issues and challenges that confront health care professionals. Key topics covered include: EEO, AAP, ADEA, ADA, OWPA, FMLA, COBRA, ERISA, HIPAA, FLSA, NLRA, Sarbanes/Oxley, ethics and the law, corporate compliance, and Medicare fraud and abuse.

PUL 331 Advancement in Critical Care Monitoring (4 credits)
This course focuses on the advanced medical and respiratory care needed for critically ill adult patients. Among the topics covered are cardiopulmonary assessment of trauma, postsurgical, cardiac and renal patients. The course will also provide instruction in advanced cardiac life-support.

PUL 332 Advanced Cardiopulmonary Sciences (4 credits)
This course provides students with techniques and methods used to analyze and evaluate the health status of critically ill patients. This course has an emphasis on the respiratory, cardiovascular and renal systems and is beneficial for students who work within a critical care facility.

PUL 490 Senior Seminar (4 credits)
This course provides the foundation for the research project. The students will engage in a literature survey of research in the instructor's area of expertise and develop a research proposal consisting of a research hypothesis, a rationale for the work and experimental design.